Imperial times- Coruscant

The trooper raised his rifle, ordering Tarik not to move. He snarled, hissing at him and flexing his claws as the second trooper arrived. Even the stupid rebels they�d been hunting would have heard the droid�s alarm and fled. The trooper obviously wasn�t paying much attention to the creature before him as he stepped forward, backing Tarik into the corner of the short alleyway.

He snarled defensively as the trooper pointed at him with the rifle again, taking into his comlink to one of the others. If they call the man in black.., Tarik thought uneasily, growling. He suddenly decided to chance an attack instead of escape.

He roared at the troopers, making the closest jump back in surprise. He lunged after the closest trooper, slashing at him with claws fully extended. The expression of terror on the troopers face was almost visible through he helmet as he scrambled backwards away from Tarik�s swipe. He snarled at the other trooper as he brought his rifle up to fire at Tarik.

The rifle was rendered incapable of firing as Tarik slashed the cooling housing around the barrel open in one swipe of his claws, throwing sparks where his claws struck.

He spun under the momentum of his slash, lashing the trooper�s leg out from under him with his tail as the first stood by at a loss. The second trooper hit the ground on his backside, the first backing away from Tarik and shouting into his comlink for help. Tarik tackled the trooper to the ground, knocking his rifle from his hands with the impact.

He hit the ground with a thud and an �Oof� of expelled air as Tarik landed on his chest. He dug his claws through the armor with a menacing snarl, feeling the black body-glove under the armor shred away as easily as the armor had under his powerful talons. The trooper let out a choked cry of pain as the claws hit skin and muscle, then bone.

The faintest perception of movement behind him made him pull out his claws with a ripping sound and whirl around just in time to se the butt of the second trooper�s rifle coming at his head. He twisted away with millimeters to spare between his snout and the rifle�s stock.

The trooper lost his balance as the strike didn�t connect, staggering under his own momentum. Tarik grabbed his arm, yanking him forward and using the trooper�s own momentum to throw him over the immobile trooper and against the wall with a sickening thump. He slid to the ground dazed, the other still laying unmoving under Tarik�s weight.

He narrowed his orange eyes at the trooper frozen beneath him, growling menacingly as he lowered his snout closer to his helmet. He snorted in the trooper�s face, fogging up his lenses for a moment as their reinforcements finally arrived.

The newly-arriving Stormtroopers looked a bit stunned by the scene before them. Two of the empire�s best soldiers lay defeated in the alley, with a lone alien creature poised like a victorious hunter on the chest of one trooper who had blood smeared on his armor.

Tarik turned from snarling at the bleeding trooper to snarl at them, flexing his claws menacingly, then glancing up at the thin ledge on the building next to him. A fire escape ladder hung some fifteen feet above his head, leading all the way to an open emergency door. He flashed the troopers a snarling grin, sliding off the bleeding trooper�s chest and twitching his tail as he calculated the jump.

Normally, he would never have made it, but thanks to the adrenaline boost of the fight, he knew he could make it. One of the troopers vainly ordered him to stay where he was, aiming his rifle at him. Tarik barely noticed, pushing all his concentration into jumping onto the escape ladder. His muscles coiled and tensed under his green striped skin, preparing himself as his tail swished anxiously.

He leapt up without thinking of missing, barely avoiding a blaster bolt that screamed through the air right where he�d previously been crouched. His claws snagged the metal of the lowest rung of the ladder, catching himself and pulling himself up, he looked down at the astonished Stormtroopers. He growled at them one last time, then took off up the ladder and disappeared through an open window.

The man in black would love hearing about this, he thought sarcastically.

--------------

Darth Vader smacked the search teams� report off his desk angrily.

Why? Why now, when he didn�t need to be distracted. Why was this...this...thing suddenly everywhere?

The rebels had escaped, and he�d nearly lost two men to this creature�s attack. One was still unconscious from being slammed off a wall, the other was too frightened to speak, ten deep gashes in a hand-print pattern across his chest that would turn into scars long before they would heal. Though the terror still reflected in his eyes would never heal.

Vader glared at the datapad, willing its insides to melt and smolder, reducing the datapad to a pile of molten plastic and wires. He fumed, raging emotions begging him to seek out the creature he�d missed the first time and destroy it.

This thing, this...Tarik, the half-breed creation of the empire�s own scientists, it had to be destroyed. He�d foreseen years ago, that in their creation there was a danger waiting to strike in such unstoppable and unpredictable creatures.

A creature capable of hunting and killing a Jedi Knight would be more than capable of hunting and killing several average beings, or other Force-sensitives, Dark Jedi included. Their instinct was to hunt down any force-wielding creature they were aimed at, and kill them. He�d seen the prototype creature tear apart both a hapless apprentice the Emperor had tested it on, as well as its� supposed �controller�, the scientist supervising the experiment and one of the imperial guards who�d gotten too close.

Vader had been ordered to personally oversee the destruction of all the creatures after that, the emperor wanted no chance of one being missed and used against either himself or Vader.

But one had been missed.

An earlier prototype, one that was apparently not vicious enough for the scientists� tastes, had been kept in a separate part of the lab. The poor creature had been left neglected and abused after the second prototype was created, and was later abandoned completely.

He�d seen the only remaining images of the creature, a static-tinged and fire-faded recording of the creature in its cage. The first prototype looked nothing like the second. The first was a graceful green creature with darker green stripes, it looked almost humanoid, except for the tail. It had dark reddish-brown curly hair, and orange-gold eyes that sparkled with curiosity and intelligence.

The second prototype was hideous by comparison, a twisted and mottled green-black, with spikes instead of hair, and cruel orange-red eyes framed by a rim of spikes above the brow. It had shown no sign of self-intelligence, only acting on the instinct to kill everything in the room. Vader had been glad to see the horrific creature destroyed in the crossfire of Stormtrooper�s rifles in the testing room, torn to shreds next to its victims.

Now this thing had come back to haunt him. The first prototype, now calling itself Tarik, was roaming the streets, causing all sorts of havoc for him.

First, it had been spotted not long after its escape, throwing rocks and debris at passing Stormtroopers and other imperial officers. Then, in the lower levels of the city, reports filtered in about a creature matching its description running around, still throwing things at Stormtroopers on occasion, but mostly running from patrols. Years had passed, and the gangly yet graceful creature in the recording had matured into a street-hardened warrior.

Graceful, agile, quick beyond belief, apparently able to sense approaching patrols and escape, and still extremely dangerous. He�d become a lethal warrior, and an expert at evading capture, and if the most recent report was correct, possibly Force-sensitive in his own right.

The thought of a being capable of hunting a Jedi actually being force-sensitive was frightening enough, but this thing appeared to be more than that. The quickness, the precision of his attack, and the impossible leap to his escape all pointed in a direction Vader didn�t like.

This creature wasn�t a reject, he was exactly what they�d envisioned when the project was started. He was force-enabled, able to use his semi-latent abilities without realizing what he was doing. Vader shuddered mentally to think of what this thing could do if it ever realized the scope of the vague abilities it possessed.

He was going to make sure that it didn�t live long enough to learn anything more.

Vader stood, walking around his desk and stepping on the still-smoldering datapad to extinguish the flickering flames. There were many things to be done, but none too important to put off until he�d finished off this creature.

If he could, he thought uneasily.

It had been designed to kill people like him, what if he couldn�t defeat it? He kicked at the molten datapad thoughtfully.

I am Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Sith, if I cannot defeat some hybrid freak, I do not deserve my position, he snapped at himself, straightening up.

He swore to himself that this creature would not survive long enough to threaten him. He stormed off down the hallway, knowing the Emperor already had his own copy of the report by now.

*This thing will not live to see many more sunrises, I will see to this personally, and this time, there will be no escape.*

----on to Part 4 of Chapter 2---

© 2000 Michelle Petrosky

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